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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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where they are free from all those obstacles which obstruct the passage in steam-boats . In this delightful vessel you are thus accommodated and fed at a liberally and handsomely furnished table , and taken from New York to Albany , a distance of one
hundred and fifty miles for four dollars each person . Now , before I go any further , let me beg you to lay a modern map of the States of New York and Pennsylvania before you ,
that you may the more fully understand our route , and after following us to Albany you may then trace us to Schenectady , at which place we took the canal-boat to Utica . We found
these boats very comfortable , and the sail was through a very fine country , in many places highly romantic , particularly a place called the Little Falls , which is a sweet little village situated near the Mohawk river
which has a sufficient descent at this place to give rapidity and a considerable degree of agitation to its stream , and is bordered with high , rocky and
romantic banks . This little spot had so much the appearance of a mixture of quietness , industry and cheerfulness , ( for there is a considerable degree of business carried on there since the canal furnished facilities for
transportation , ) that we determined , when we were disposed to spend a vacation in quietness and retirement , to go to the Little Falls . At Utica we stopped a day for the sake of visiting the Trenton Falls , \ yhich are situated about fifteen miles from that
town . But here I feel totally at a loss how to express myself to give you an idea of the grandeur of the scene or the exquisite feelings of pleasure which we enjoyed . I have just said to Mr . , who is at this moment sitting chatting with -, that I am at a loss to know what
name to give to the channel through which the water passes , and he tells me to call it a " Mammoth watercut . " You may imagine then an immense cut formed by the passage of a stream , of the width , I should
suppose , of the eighth of a mile , and of the depth of about two hundred feet ; through this cut the water passes sometimes in a smooth and perfectly crystal stream , and at other times dashes through the opposing rocks as if it had only at that moment burst
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them asunder and was still boiling with fury at the opposition which they had offered to its course . We rambled up this stream to the distance of about two miles , and passed in this space no less than six falls of water , all differing in their character
and style of beauty and grandeur , and of different heights ; the lowest , I believe , about six feet high , and the highest between forty and fifty . These falls , some descending in a smooth sheet and others bursting in torrents
of foam , are rendered doubly beautiful by the romantic beauty and verdure of the banks between which they are inclosed , and the noble trees which hang- bending over them as if anxious to catch a glimpse of their own luxuriant branches in the
transparent water . But I feel that I am committing an absurdity in attempting to give a description of this enchanting place , for it would require a much more powerful pen than mine to give even a faint idea of its beauty . On our return to Utica we again took the canal-boat to Syracuse , where are some very extensive salt works which
we visited . On our way from this place to Rochester we passed the beautiful lakes of Cayuga , Seneca and Canandaigua , on all of which are placed very pretty and flourishing
towns . A great proportion of the road between these places to Rochester , and that town itself was only , a very few year ago , a wilderness . You evidently see that a place has been cut out in the woods for it
and the stumps of trees , which are still standing- in the roads over which you pass , shew how very recently that spot , which is now the busy haunt of man and the scene of his numerous devices , was the lodge only of wild beasts . Seven years ago , Rochester was in this wild state , and
now it is a flourishing town containing seven thousand inhabitants . It is most curious to mark these signs of recent and rapid growth ; their affect is similar to that which is produced by the relics of antiquity in the old
countries ; they each call forth the imagination , leading it only in different directions—the one sending it back to what has been , and the other carrying it forward to that which is to come . This sudden growth of the town of Rochester is owing to the
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654 Description of a Tour from Philadelphia to the Falls of Niagara .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Nov. 2, 1826, page 654, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2554/page/18/
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